Embodiments of the present invention relate generally to methods and systems for tracking and interacting with one or more processes and more particularly to tracking recent activities of the processes and presenting recommended next actions based thereon.
An application such as an enterprise application can allow users to track, interact with, and/or manage processes that can involve other parties and may run over an extended period of time. For example, in a procurement process, business users such as category managers are involved in many procurement transactions such as Requests for Quotes (RFQs), Requests for Information (RFIs), and auctions at any one time. Activities may occur on several of these transactions over the course of hours and/or days. For example, the category manager may get invited by another user to collaborate on an RFQ, suppliers may have recently placed bids on an auction he had published, a recent RFQ may have just become overdue for awarding, etc.
However, current applications for managing such processes do not provide an easy way for the user to keep track of and interact with these processes and especially more than one process at a time. For example, existing procurement applications do not provide systematic information on recent activities related to ongoing RFQs etc. for which a user is waiting. Furthermore, once an event related to such a process has occurred, e.g., a quote has been received, existing applications provide no guidance as to what action should be taken, nor do they enable taking that action easily. Rather, using an existing application, the user needs to query various screens in the application to determine what activities occurred for each transaction in which he is involved. The user then determines the next appropriate action for each activity. Then, the user navigates the application, e.g., through menus etc., to execute the next actions to progress the process. This approach is not only time consuming but prone to error as it relies heavily on the user to remember all of the processes of relevance to him and to identify and take appropriate action as needed. Hence, there is a need for improved methods and systems for tracking recent activities of the processes and presenting recommended next actions based thereon.